into the Apayao country if he had asked us; but it is practically
trailless as yet, and for a party as large as ours would have been,
questions of supply and transportation would have been difficult, to
say nothing of the impolicy of taking a large number into the country
at all. And so, on Saturday morning, May 14th, we shook hands with
Mr. Worcester and his companions. His progress so far had been an
unqualified success, unmarred by a single adverse incident, for the
deplorable loss of life at Kiangan could in no wise be attributed
to our presence or to the occasion. What the results of the visit
of 1910 will be, only time can tell; but experience shows that every
year marks an advance in the spread of friendly relations, not only
between the Government and the people, but between the subdivisions
of the people itself. [41]

The Chico being still up when we reached it, we crossed again on
submarines, climbed the bank, and found ourselves in Tabuk (or Talbok),
the most pestilential hole in the Archipelago. Nothing is left of it
now but a ruinous church and one or two houses. The first mass was said
here or hereabouts in 1689, by the Dominicans, who kept up the mission
until the monks all died of fever. Did an occasional officer in the old
days prove objectionable to the authorities in Manila, he got an order
to proceed to Tabuk for station; it was almost certain that he would
never return. The point is of unquestionable importance, commanding,
as it does, the main outlet, of the Kalinga country to the plains of
the Cagayán Valley; and so our own Government undertook to garrison
it with Constabulary as a check on raids. The garrison remained long
enough to be carried out on stretchers, and was removed to Lu-bagan,
where the check is just as complete and personal control possible.

We had a long and hard day before us, but we did not know it when we